Every self-respecting diver tries to see as much of the underwater world as possible, dive in as many places as possible and get to know as many marine inhabitants as possible. Of course, underwater it is recommended, and sometimes insisted, that divers not touch anything. But there are places where the exact opposite happens! For example, it is part of some of our club trips, which we have quite often. There they actually play with the divers. But in Playa del Carmen there is another type of entertainment for divers - feeding bull sharks!
And now you won’t be able to play here, but you will be full of impressions. And so, around November, but like all Mexicans, they do not have a clear schedule. Therefore, we recommend considering the end of November as the time of arrival of the sharks, and they are with us until March. If the divers are tasty, they may stay.
In general, from November to March we can enjoy their presence, but this turned out to be not enough, and the local people, having fallen in love with these fish, decided to feed them. And now all divers with certification or equivalent can watch sharks feeding. There are enough sharks to make divers feel like guests at this belly festival.
How do sharks feed?
The first thing we do is, of course, arrive at the place where the boat starts from. It's located right in Playa del Carmen.
Then we collect our equipment and, having gathered our courage (for the first time), we go to the boat. The boat brings us to the site, and we very disciplinedly begin the dive.
As soon as we are directly at the location we need, you will see a rope that everyone needs to grab together and sit on the bottom, close to each other. This way you create the illusion of one whole organism, and sharks do not swim between you and your neighbor.
Then just a show begins, a specially trained person who knows sharks by sight begins to feed them. At the same time, he tries to make sure that the shark grabs the food in front of everyone, and not behind his back. Therefore, you will see a lot of teeth, and the sight will also be unforgettable.
This dive is so impressive that many people sign up to re-feed the bull sharks the very next day. For our part, we try to organize all the logistics and make sure that nothing interferes with your enjoyment of diving with sharks. This includes one dive, we naturally provide cylinders and weights, transfer from your hotel in Playa del Carmen, a dive guide and all fees and taxes. There will also be drinking water on the boat.
If you still have any questions, feel free to do so.
P.S. There have been no untoward shark incidents in Mexico in more than 20 years.
While shark baiting in the media is gaining momentum, thanks to the demand for a new form of entertainment - feeding sharks - is growing rapidly.
In the United States, he breaks all popularity records.
Feeding sharks is one of the most popular activities in the diving industry. Many divers are against it, while others are completely in favor of it. It is also one of the fastest growing segments of the tourism industry.
Senator Bill Nelson introduced S.3099, the Sport Fishing Access Act, into the U.S. Senate in 2016. The bill is an amendment to the Shark Conservation Act 2010. The amendment may be made by either operating a vessel to transport a passenger to any location intended to feed sharks or observe feeding.
Feeding in the bill refers to placing food or any other edible substance in the water to feed or attract sharks.
Senator Nelson is from Florida, which already has a ban on feeding sharks in state waters.
State law prohibits feeding, but senators can only make laws affecting state waters, which extend just 3 kilometers from the shore.
Florida tour operators are now organizing underwater shark feeding trips outside of state waters, offering tourists "excursions" as far as 3 km from the shoreline.
Some continue to feed sharks in the waters to sink to the bottom a few meters from the shore.
If this bill becomes law, it will prevent these dives as well. It would also ban shark feeding on the California coast and other popular water recreation areas.
Why feed sharks?
There are many points that are raised by opponents and supporters of shark feeding as arguments. One of the strongest points on the positive side of the issue is that feeding has a mission to protect endangered shark species.
The dive operator of Stuart Cove's Dive Bahamas said that their sea diving excursions for the predator feeding program attract more than 50 thousand divers a year. This figure indicates that the myths about are not true, and that sharks need our support and protection.
Many scientists touch on the material side of the issue - about the losses that will occur if the sharks disappear. The significant decline in shark populations that is currently occurring means that tourists will be less likely to see sharks while diving.
Therefore, the practice of luring sharks with food increases the likelihood that a diver will encounter a shark. From a tourism point of view, feeding sharks will help attract divers on vacation, making diving the “number one” point of their vacation.
Is feeding sharks dangerous?
The opposing view is that feeding sharks. This will cause the shark to change its feeding habits and rely on divers instead of hunting and performing its ecological functions.
This practice damages local ecosystems by disrupting the food chain and also puts divers themselves at risk.
After all, sharks perceive people as a food supplier, therefore, when they see divers, they rush to this area for food. And if people don’t have treats, then sharks become aggressive.
According to international shark attack statistics, all attacks on humans are classified as provoked or unprovoked.
The world's largest provider of dive certification services, PADI, currently offers specialized dive courses and is also involved in shark conservation and protection initiatives.
Many specialty gear stores offer "shark awareness" courses. And the media pays close attention to the diving industry, increasing public interest in the top predators through exciting television shows, the release of thematic magazines, and news feeds.
Conservation communities are also paying attention to the growing interest in shark diving as a lever for creating more sustainable shark conservation practices.
If a shark can be worth more live as a tourist attraction than as a food product, then this type of activity presents a potentially compelling industry case for tourism agencies and organizations involved in developing measures.
This is exactly the kind of analysis that was done in Micronesia. Experts have quantified the value of Palau's shark diving industry and found that its value far exceeds the income from shark fishing.
In the case of Palau, the estimated annual value of one shark to the tourism industry is $179,000 (or $1.9 million over the shark's lifetime).
In contrast, one shark fin can only fetch $108. For Palau, this research has made it possible to make economic sense in permanently protecting sharks in its waters.
Shark diving must therefore remain a successful, safe and sustainable business as much as possible.
Interest in sharks actively attracts tourists to the underwater world, says marine ecologist Sean Ryden.I'm very lucky that my job allows me to travel all over the world, take advantage of opportunities to see sharks in person, and study shark diving "in multiple scenarios."
I've encountered a variety of situations - on some shark dives I felt safe. During others, with other instructors, I was very afraid for my life.
I have seen sharks both relaxed and careful while feeding, as well as angry at human actions.
This gave Sean reason to argue that underwater shark feeding deserves special attention as a mass business, and that the money accumulated in this area is a powerful incentive to save the ocean's top predator, regardless of the experience and knowledge of tourists.
From this point of view, great attention should be paid to investing in the competent training of instructors, strengthening measures and equipping with tools.
Then such safe diving initiatives will be easier to turn into quick profits, making the business highly profitable.
Sean Ryden showed a photo that was taken during this type of dive south of Cancun on the Riviera Maya in Mexico several years ago.
The dive operator approached the people on the shore (including Sean) and suggested an "underwater adventure" to see the bull sharks that naturally migrate to this part of Mexico every winter.
We entered the water at the beach, swam about 50 meters from the shore, and were lowered into the water with additional weights.We waited for the cameraman to join us with a bucket of bait fish to attract the sharks. I saw maybe three bull sharks on the dive.
They began to feed them not far from us. But the sharks were swimming towards us too quickly, we could see stains of fish oil all around us.
Overall it was a scary and dangerous dive with poor visibility and unpredictably behaving sharks. It seemed that an accident was about to happen and the shark would suddenly attack one of us.
And I was constantly aware of how close we were to the shore. And how close, it turns out, these dangerous sharks are to the places where unsuspecting people rest.
In subsequent years, they reached the peak of popularity in the Mexican Yucatan. The first operator in Playa del Carmen legally set up a bull shark diving business off the Yucatan.
He soon had competitors in the business, including some very irresponsible travel agents. Shark diving and feeding have been offered in locations close to crowded beaches along densely populated areas of Playa del Carmen.
The Riviera Maya Hotel Association began to receive complaints from hotel owners and organizers of coastal vacations.
Many local communities have expressed concern about the presence and feeding of sharks so close to shore.
They received great public attention in 2011. In February, a 38-year-old tourist from Canada was seriously injured when a shark bit off her hand and caused severe injuries to her body. And already in March, a shark attacked a tourist from Russia and injured her leg.
Both attacks took place in Cancun, one of the most popular resorts in the world.
The local government responded to the incident by moving her from Cancun to Playa del Carmen.
There were many sharks, mostly pregnant females, as an ill-conceived demonstration of the municipality's decisive action.
The culprit for this situation, in fact, was the lack of a strict code of conduct, safety protocols for client dives, as well as the lack of any control over the activities of this industry at the local government level.
Today, measures to protect sharks and develop the diving industry are deeper and more comprehensive. We can only hope that public awareness will play a significant role in this process.
My husband and son (2.7 years old) six months ago were at the aquarium in the Rio shopping center and I was interested not only in looking at the marine life, but also in comparing these aquariums.
Moskvarium is open daily from 10:00 to 22:00, we decided to go on a weekday: it’s cheaper and there are fewer visitors. We did not buy tickets in advance on-line; now there are no queues at the entrance, and you can buy tickets both at the Moskvarium itself and at the box office at VDNKh. We bought tickets at the box office near the main entrance.
Ticket prices are high. The lowest fare is daily from 10 to 16 (Monday to Thursday): adult ticket 800 rubles, children's ticket (child up to 120 cm tall) 600 rubles. After 16-00 and on weekends prices are even higher and higher. What is unpleasantly surprising is not just the high cost of a child’s ticket, but also the gradation by height, not age. (For comparison, a ticket to the oceanarium in the Rio shopping center on weekdays costs 500 rubles, a child’s ticket costs 250 rubles, and children under 5 years old are generally free).
I was also surprised that there were no signs anywhere on how to get to the aquarium; it’s good that we knew where it was, since in the summer we walked at VDNKh and saw huge queues of people wanting to get inside.
Upon entering the aquarium, visitors will undergo a serious security check. Everyone who rang in the frame is checked with a hand-held metal detector and asked to remove all metal objects, even small change in their pockets, and all bags are checked. My husband and I often went to football games before and were used to such checks, but people who encountered this for the first time may not like it.
On the ground floor of the aquarium there are ticket offices, a cloakroom, souvenir shops, and a cafe; it is very spacious inside. You can see the fish from the wardrobe; through the glass wall you can see a large marine aquarium and a tunnel.
To view the exhibition you need to go down the stairs or on the escalator. Guests are greeted by a full-wall graphic waterfall. Images of water droplets appear and then fall. Not impressed.
In front of the turnstiles there is a diagram of the oceanarium.
The exhibition is divided into zones according to fish habitat.
We started our inspection from the end, since we arrived shortly before the start of feeding the sharks and, so as not to miss anything, we immediately headed to the large aquarium.
Feeding sharks.
You can watch shark feeding three times a week: Monday, Wednesday and Friday at 14:00. The fish are fed by two scuba divers located directly in the aquarium.
They give the fish pieces of food (apparently also fish) on a stick, and also feed the fish from their hands and even stroke them.
Many visitors gathered to see this spectacle, so the father had to put his son on his neck so that the child could see everything. The impressions from feeding the fish turned out to be the most vivid for my son; he did not want to leave this aquarium, and at home he remembered how air bubbles rose from the scuba divers, and of course he depicted a large shark.
In addition to feeding the sharks, the aquarium hosts the following events:
Exciting feeding of the friendliest and smartest inhabitants of the Aquarium - charming seals, takes place every day
Every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday at 14.00 in the "Flooded Forest" aquarium you can watch the freshwater giants of the Amazon - the beautiful arapaima - take fish directly from the hands of divers
In "Reservoirs of South Africa" every Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday at 13.00 feeding of small but very dangerous freshwater predators - piranhas
Exposition.
Since we examined the aquarium from the end, I’ll tell you about it in the same sequence.
The tunnel turned out to be very small, like in the Rio shopping center, and did not make much of an impression. You can see a shark swimming overhead.
The crowd's favorite was this huge fish swimming back and forth along the glass. Everyone could take great pictures next to her.
Opposite the shark aquarium there is a pool with Baikal seals. The very cute animals seemed to rejoice at the visitors and twirled, tumbled and played near the glass to the delight of children and adults.
Bright exotic fish reminded us of the coral reefs of Egypt.
But I had previously only seen a clown fish swimming among the tentacles of sea anemones only on TV.
Unfortunately, my son soon got tired and we quickly ran through part of the exhibition. We didn’t pay much attention to the usual aquarium fish, of which there were quite a few.
But we couldn’t pass by the caiman and turtles.
My son really liked the turtles. And not only him, there were a lot of people around these pools.
I was impressed by the killer whale. And although we were only able to look at it from afar, this beautiful, powerful and at the same time graceful animal did not leave us indifferent. But it was not possible to really see the dolphins; only moving silhouettes were visible through the water column and the net.
At the very beginning of the exhibition I really liked the stingrays, which looked like birds, but with very long thin tails. They swam from one aquarium to another and returned back.
The aquarium contains a large number of freshwater fish.
Photos.
Photography is allowed in the aquarium; there is no additional charge for this (unlike Rio). But taking pictures is only allowed without flash. This rule does not apply to professional photographers, who are fenced off in special areas near the most beautiful aquariums. They do not disturb ordinary visitors much, since there are similar aquariums nearby with free access.
We couldn't resist and decided to take a family photo as a keepsake. The photographer girl offered us props: she put a red pirate hat on her son, which matched his red trousers, and gave us a musket; my husband got the steering wheel. She shot more than 20 frames and would have continued filming, but her son categorically refused to pose any further. The photographer gave us a plastic card with a barcode. With which you can view the captured footage and order printing at the terminals or at the Photo Cashier at the exit.
The cost of one photo measuring 15x20cm is 350 rubles, the photo is accompanied by a cardboard frame. You can print a photo in a larger format or choose a magnet with your photo, or you can transfer the photo to a flash drive. The cost of a flash drive with 10 photos is 1,750 rubles. We limited ourselves to 1 photo. We received the photo within 5 minutes. There is no need to throw away the receipt; it contains a code with which paid photos can be downloaded on the Moskvarium website.
The aquarium made sure that visitors could take interesting photos not only against the backdrop of fish. For example, in the halls there are huge shells, illuminated from the inside, in which you can sit, a high screen with a painted shark, the opening of whose open mouth can just fit a couple of people. I liked the roomy wooden boat, and my son, forgetting about fatigue, climbed on a large dinosaur whose eyes and teeth were like real ones.
Now there are not as many visitors to the aquarium as in the first months of operation. We arrived at 1:45 pm, there were still quite a lot of people, several people were standing at each aquarium. But by 15 o’clock, the number of visitors had noticeably decreased, and it was possible to calmly photograph the fish and take pictures ourselves, without disturbing anyone.
In the aquarium, I liked both the design of the aquariums and the interior in general.
Everything is modern, without stucco and unnecessary decorative elements, like in Rio.
It is very convenient that inside the exhibition there are areas where children can sit and there is a cafe.
The aquarium staff are friendly and welcoming.
In general, Moskvarium and Rio are similar, but I liked Moskvarium more! It has a more extensive exhibition, more spacious premises, and well-thought-out infrastructure.
We will definitely return to Moskvarium later, when our son is a little older!
One of the main spectacles that attracts divers from all over the world to the Fijian archipelago is shark feeding show. Fiji is called the number one place for diving with sharks in the world.
Where is shark feeding done?
Feedings take place regularly Beka Lagoon (Beqa, reads like Benga or even Mbenga), approximately 10 min. by boat from the shore of the main island of Fiji - Viti Levu
What sharks can you see while feeding?
At almost every feeding dive, representatives of seven (!) species of sharks gather: blacktip and whitetip reef sharks, gray reef sharks, silver sharks, nurse sharks, lemon sharks and the undoubted stars of the show - bullish(stubby) sharks. Regularly, at least once a month, divers can observe another representative of the main three predatory sharks - tiger shark.
Of course, in addition to sharks, many jack fish, groupers, snappers, etc. feed.
How do sharks feed?
Observation is carried out without a cage. Spectators descend to a depth of approx. 30 m to a specially prepared area (“arena”), one instructor begins feeding, the rest monitor the safety of the guests.
There are always many nurse sharks, they are active and not afraid. Lemons are usually singly or in pairs. The main stars are large bull sharks, taking food directly from the hands of the instructor-feeder.
The dive lasts about 50 minutes.
Recommendations: strictly maintain the position indicated by the instructor. Keep your arms crossed or resting lightly on the bottom. Stay calm and refrain from unnecessary sudden movements. Follow the instructors' signals. Please note that if you remain immobile for a long time, even in relatively warm water you can get very cold; it is better to take a thicker suit.
Shark feeding video
A panoramic aquarium with a capacity of twenty thousand liters is filled with real sea inhabitants, both peaceful starfish or small reef fish, and dangerous predators - blacktip sharks. You just have to take a step inside the aquarium and you are already surrounded by sharks that are cutting circles around you, hoping to profit from prey.
When
Where
Marine Aquarium - Oceanarium, Chistye Prudy metro station.
What is the price
Ticket prices range from 100 to 200 rubles.
Description of the event
What will happen after? A brave hand will penetrate the aquarium and throw pieces of meat to the sea monsters. Right before your eyes, jaws with thousands of teeth will begin to tear apart pieces of meat. If you want to see this terrifying and terribly exciting spectacle with your own eyes, hurry up and buy tickets to the Oceanarium of the Moscow Marine Aquarium.
You can purchase tickets to the shark feeding show at the organizer's price in just a few clicks, even without leaving home.
This show will appeal to both curious children and their fearless parents, both wildlife lovers and horror movie fans. The Shark Feeding Show is a spectacle you won't soon forget. Maybe for a few more nights you will dream of terrifying clattering jaws, cloudy water and the crazy eyes of sea predators devouring fresh meat.
It's no wonder that so many people come to watch this show every day. After all, these are transcendental emotions and real animal rage. And, best of all, you will be completely safe.
Who is it suitable for?
For children and adults, nature and animal lovers, as well as those who want to see real feeding of sharks and moray eels.
Why is it worth going
- A panoramic aquarium allows you to be in the heart of the action
- Absolutely safe
- Opportunity to see predatory fish up close
